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Do-it-yourself publishing takes off on the Internet

By RICHARD MULLINS
Rochester Democrat and Chronicle

ANNETTE LEIN / ROCHESTER (N.Y.) DEMOCRAT & CHRONICLE Printer Doug Ferraro checks a book at Colorcentrics, a Rochester, N.Y., company that prints books on demand. Colorcentrics will print as many books as you want, even editions of one.

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ROCHESTER, N.Y. — When Ross Yockey and his daughter, Beth, wanted to write a book parodying the national No Child Left Behind educational standards, they had no time or interest in the traditional book-publishing route.

Instead, the Seattle residents — who wanted their book in readers' hands before the November presidential vote — uploaded their completed manuscript to a North Carolina-based Internet company called Lulu.com.

Within minutes, the book was available for sale online. Each time a purchase is made, a printer in Rochester, N.Y., makes an individual copy that is shipped to the buyer, typically in 24 hours or less. The royalties are split automatically among the Yockeys, Lulu and the printer, ColorCentric.

"I'm a longtime author, with 15 books published," said Yockey, who has also written biographies on former Bank of America CEO Hugh McColl and composer-conductor Andre Previn. "This is the first one that hasn't gone those usual channels," which he said can be lucrative but lengthy.

The book, "Strictly for the Birds," hasn't gone blockbuster yet, Ross said, although that wasn't the goal. He and his daughter wanted to make a point — and fast. "It was super, mega, totally crazy fast," said Beth, 26.

Such on-demand printing is still a small fraction of the book industry. But it is quickly opening avenues for authors to bring their books to market directly, quickly and sometimes cost-free.

"There were a lot of early abortive efforts to try this," said Jim Hamilton, an analyst with InfoTrends/CAP Ventures in Weymouth, Mass. "There was a concept that there would be instant-book kiosks in bookstores, and that did not work. ... But we are in a very creative phase now and it's very exciting."

This kind of publishing might just foster a market for book-writing in the same way Kodak first opened up photography to amateur picture takers nearly a century ago, said Frank Cost, a printing professor at the Rochester Institute of Technology.

"Everyone is starting to realize this works, and it's fantastic," Cost said.

A string of on-demand book publishers has cropped up in the last few years, including iUniverse.com, AuthorHouse.com, Xlibris.com, CafePress.com, uPublish.com and Lulu.com. While prices vary depending on the services offered, most work in similar ways.
 
Authors write their texts, sometimes including photos and illustrations, then upload the book via the Internet to the publisher. Some list the books directly with Internet retailers such as Amazon.com, BarnesandNoble.com and Borders.com.

IUniverse.com, for example, is partly owned by Barnes & Noble and has positioned itself much like a traditional publishing house, requiring the author to go through copy editing and review. It also offers layout and cover design for a flat fee.

"We're focusing on being a farm team for people who want to get into the publishing industry," said Lynette Petersen, spokeswoman for iUniverse, based in Lincoln, Neb. "We will always produce the books meant for friends and families. But we're designing books also so they have more appeal to the traditional channels in the publishing industry."

Other publishers, such as Lulu.com, opt for a more direct approach: Authors upload their text, which printers produce as is.

"If we are wildly successful, it's not that we're going to steal 5 percent of sales from Random House or other publishers," said Bob Young, Lulu.com's founder as well as the founder of open-source software company Red Hat. "It's because we're creating a whole new industry and bringing a whole new category of content to the market."

Printers can produce just one copy of a book profitably now.

"A number of titles can be successful if run in quantities of 10 or 20 books, or even one copy," said Thomas Wetjen, vice president of Xerox Graphic Communications' Industry, Production Systems Group.